Daisies
by figgyleaf
Summary: After coming back from Australia, Rin can't wrap his mind around falling in love again. Haru tries to open his heart. HaruRin.
1. Chapter 1

She loves me…

Pluck.

She loves me not…

Pluck. Rin grinned at the one remaining petal of the now-nearly-naked daisy in his hand.

"Is fate telling me something?" Rin laughed at how absurd he was acting, but he couldn't help but feel it was true. "Stephanie loves me, right?" After all, that was the only explanation for why she was acting weird around him. She acted all bubbly for most the other guys, except Rin.

Proof? Rin could count all the ways she tried to flirt with him, obviously playing hard-to-get. They sat next to each other during Algebra, a class they shared at Australia's prestigious Gould Athletic Preparatory Academy. Sometimes he'd ask to borrow her eraser and she'd blush, clutching the eraser to her chest and mutter quickly, "Sorryit'smybrother's." Then the guy sitting in front of them would ask to borrow it and she'd hand it over without hesitation.

But she'd lure him back with her emerald eyes and requests to help her with math homework. How could Rin say no to those long lashes?

Rin wasn't sure how this weird infatuation with Stephanie started. It definitely wasn't love at first sight; his first impression of her was that she had unusually beautiful flaxen long hair, but that was about it. They weren't even in the same echelon in terms of skill, as Stephanie didn't swim as well as Rin. Their only connection was this one algebra class.

And he was sure something must have happened where one mistook something from the other as a flirt, causing the other to flirt back, and boom his current obsession of her spontaneously generated. Just who started it, Rin doesn't really care right now.

Stephanie, he was convinced, had the hots for him.

"Yeah right," Dustin said, punching Rin's shoulder.

Rin scoffed at his relay buddy as he stuffed a helping of cafeteria food into his mouth. "What, jealous?"

"Pfft, of course not. There's nothing to be jealous of," Dustin said, laughing. "Am I supposed to want a flower telling me who I'm gonna marry?"

That drew a frown from Rin. "It's not just the flower. It's all sorts of things, I've been telling you that! You know, signs."

"The only sign I see is that you're a weirdo, I mean, seriously, who thinks this much over some girl?" Dustin rolled his eyes, and then a passerby with a blue cap greets him with a hi-five.

"Oh geez, don't tell me Rin's talking about Stephanie again," Brandon, adjusting his cap, said.

"You guys suck."

"Rin, that fate stuff is kinda out there. We'll believe you when we see some…" Brandon made an "O" shape with his hand and put his index finger in it. Loud laughter followed a long groan. The laughter stopped, though, when a small flaxen-haired girl approached the table and stood in front of Rin.

"Rin," she said, eyes downcast, a blush on her cheeks. "Can you... follow me somewhere? I wanna ask you something."


	2. Chapter 2

Once Rin's silhouette disappeared into the night for sure, Nagisa said softly, "Rin-chan... changed a lot." Well, that was a great conversation opener. The four of Iwatobi Swim Club stood in the dark swimming hall of Samezuka Academy in awkward silence. Rei cleared his throat.

"Maybe something happened in Australia," Makoto wondered. He looked at the dark-haired boy standing next to him, hair still wet from the race earlier. Haru's eyes looked at the ground in that hazy way it usually did when he was thinking about something.

"Haru," Makoto said, placing his hand on Haru's shoulder. "Let's go home."

Haru, without a word, started walking out the door in only his swim tights. Rei gawked and said, "You'll catch a cold!" Nagisa brought Haru his warm-up jacket as Makoto laughed.

As Haru pulled the sleeves of his jacket on, he couldn't help but think that Rin had met the four of them alone, outnumbered. But he acted as if he wasn't. The question that kept pounding into Haru's head was, Why?

Later that week, Rin got a text on his phone as he was relaxing in his bunk bed.

_let's meet up. –Haru_

How the…? Rin's first thoughts flew to confusion and questions that start with the five W's. More specifically, he wanted to ask Haru how he got ahold of his number, but damn it if he was going to sound flustered or confused. Another option was to ignore the text, which seemed to be a better idea.

Rin put down the phone, far away from him. There was no need to look at it after all—Haru wouldn't text him again, right? Of course not. This didn't prevent Rin from checking his phone every five minutes, though.

After about an hour, Rin finally shot back a reply.

_what, do you want me to beat your pasty ass in a race again?_

There. That was satisfyingly demeaning. Rin pushes his phone away from him again and tries to get a nap in when his phone buzzes.

_yes. samezuka academy, 11 pm. –Haru_

What the actual fuck…? This was kind of suspicious. And almost equally important, how did Haru get his number?

_btw kou gave me your number. –Haru_

Oh.

* * *

><p>The first thing Rin saw when he entered the swimming pool facility was Haru sitting on a bench with a Styrofoam tray in his hands. <em>Drugs?! I knew something weird was up with this meeting!<em>

Instead Haru opened the tray and took out a wooden stick with a piece of fried mackerel skewered onto it. He offered it to Rin. It was still warm, crisp with oil, and redolent of Japanese street fare. Damn, after years of being in Australia, Rin missed this kind of food. And he knows he shouldn't, but…

"Whatever," he mutters quickly, taking a bite out of the skewer and a seat on the bench. Haru takes out another one and starts eating it as well.

As the silence between them grew tense, Rin coughed and asked tentatively, "Err… what do you want?" It was all the more awkward that Haru was looking at Rin very closely, making the other wonder if there was a fly on his face or something. _He only got weirder since middle school_, Rin concluded.

"When was the last time you felt free, Rin?"

Of course, Haru was going to go off on some abstraction the first time they have a face-to-face conversation. Unless he was asking him out on a date or something—"felt free?" No! What? Rin mentally slapped himself.

"Didn't you want to race? Come on, let's go," Rin grumbled.

"You beat me yesterday. That's good enough."

Rin looked down at his piece of fish in confusion. What did Haru want from him now? Oh right, he hadn't answered that question yet.

"Define 'free,'" he challenged.

Haru put a fist to his cheek, leaning onto it. I guess that was a pretty good response, Rin noted to himself. "The feeling you get when you swim. Gliding through water. No resistance, just serene movement. Like teamwork."

Didn't they just have a swimming race yesterday? "About twenty-four hours ago? I don't get what you're trying to ask," Rin said stiffly.

"No, no," Haru said, shaking his head gently as if he were trying to clarify his own thoughts in his mind. "_Free_, as in…" He struggled to find the words.

Rin stood up, frustrated. "Look, thanks for the food and all, but I came for a race, not to yap about philosophy. I'm going." As he started walking off, though, Haru clutched his wrist.

"Wait," Haru said softly. "Just… you're not alone." All Rin could do was stare at Haru's unyielding blue eyes, scoff, and shake the hand off. He didn't have time for this shit. Still, Rin couldn't help but feel a blush spreading across his cheeks. It had been years since he felt a warm hand.


End file.
